The sage at the door
Episode 3 of 20 in Ramayana: Valmiki's story, told gently.
Narrated with an AI voice.
- Reading time
- 6 min
- Listening time
- 9 min
- By
- DharmikStudio Originals
- Narration
- AI voice
Read along
Namaste. Welcome back. Last time, four little boys were born in Ayodhya, and we saw how Lakshmana would not sleep unless Rama was beside him. Now the boys have grown. Rama is not yet sixteen.
Let us breathe once together. In. And out.
**
One day, while Dasharatha sits with his counsellors, discussing whom his sons should marry, the doorkeepers come in a hurry. The sage **Vishwamitra** is at the gate.
Vishwamitra is famous. He was once a king, and by long, hard tapas became a brahmarshi, a sage of the highest kind. People respect him and are also a little afraid of his temper.
Dasharatha goes out himself with the priests to welcome him, touches his feet, gives him water and a seat, and says with a full heart, your coming is like rain on dry land. Tell me what you want. Whatever it is, I will do it.
That is a big promise. And Vishwamitra takes him at his word.
He says, I am performing a yajna. Each time it nears its end, two powerful rakshasas, **Maricha** and **Subahu**, come and spoil it. I cannot curse them, because anger would break my vow. Give me your eldest son Rama for ten days. He will protect the yajna. Do not think of him as a child. I know who he is. Vasishtha knows it too.
**
Dasharatha's face goes pale. For a moment he cannot speak. Then the words pour out of a father.
He says, my Rama is not yet sixteen. He has never seen a battle. Take my army instead. Take me. I will go with my bow. I am sixty thousand years old, and this son came to me only after long hardship. How can I send him? Please do not take Rama.
Vishwamitra's eyes flash. He says, you promised, and now you take it back. This does not suit the house of Raghu. If you are happy, I will go back the way I came.
The ground seems to shake with his anger. And now, quietly, **Vasishtha** speaks. He is the family teacher, and he knows both men well.
He says to the king, you were born in the line of Ikshvaku. You are known as a king who keeps his word. Do not break it now. And listen, Rama will be safe with Vishwamitra, safer than anywhere. This sage knows every kind of divine weapon. He does not need Rama for his own strength. He is asking for Rama's good.
Dasharatha listens. His heart settles. He calls Rama, and Lakshmana with him, and the mothers bless them, and Vasishtha chants the blessings, and the two boys walk out behind the sage.
I think every parent knows this moment. We want to hold our children close. But sometimes a wiser voice tells us, let them go with this teacher, it is for their good.
**
They walk a long way along the south bank of the Sarayu. Rama walks close to the sage, Lakshmana behind with the bows. The poem says they looked like two young fire-bright sons of Shiva walking behind Brahma.
After a day's walk, Vishwamitra stops by the river and says to Rama, sip some water, my child. I want to give you two teachings, **Bala** and **Atibala**. With these you will not feel tired, you will not feel hunger or thirst, and no one will catch you off guard, even in sleep. Rama sips water, listens with folded hands, and receives them. That night the two princes, who had always slept on soft palace beds, sleep on grass, by the river, and they are content.
This is the start of their real education. For many days the sage walks with them and tells them the story of every place they pass. Here is the ashram where Shiva once sat in tapas. Here is a forest that was once a flourishing country. This is how the river got its name. The whole land becomes a book, and every hill a page.
**
When they reach the forest near Vishwamitra's ashram, they meet the first of the dangers he had spoken of, a fierce rakshasi named **Tataka**, who has turned a whole country empty. The poem says Rama at first did not want to raise his bow against a woman, and only acted when Vishwamitra explained that protecting people is a prince's first duty. We will say no more than that.
Pleased with the boys, Vishwamitra gives Rama many divine weapons, and teaches him also how to call them back.
At the ashram, called **Siddhashrama**, the yajna begins. For six days and nights Rama and Lakshmana stand guard without sleep. On the last day, Maricha and Subahu come, as the sage had said. Rama turns them back, and Maricha is carried far away over the sea. Remember Maricha. He will return later in our story. The yajna is completed in peace.
**
Now Vishwamitra says, King **Janaka** of **Mithila** is holding a great yajna, and he has a wonderful bow. Let us go there.
On the way, near Mithila, they come upon an old ashram, quiet and empty, but still beautiful. Rama asks whose it was.
Vishwamitra tells him. This was the ashram of the sage **Gautama** and his wife **Ahalya**. Long ago, Indra came here in the form of Gautama, and Ahalya was drawn into a wrong. Gautama in his anger said that she would live here for many thousands of years, unseen by anyone, living on air, in tapas, until Rama came. When Rama arrived, she would be freed.
So Rama and Lakshmana enter the ashram. And there Ahalya becomes visible, shining from her long tapas, like a flame hidden in smoke, like the moon behind cloud. The two princes bow and touch her feet. She remembers Gautama's words, and she welcomes them as guests, with water and fruit, with all respect. Flowers fall from the sky. And Gautama himself returns and accepts his wife again.
I want to point out something gentle here. In Valmiki, Rama bows to Ahalya. He does not judge her. He touches her feet and accepts her welcome. Many of you will have heard that Ahalya had turned to stone, and that she came back to life at the touch of Rama's foot. That beautiful picture comes from later tellings, like the **Adhyatma Ramayana** and Tulsidas's **Ramcharitmanas**, and it is very dear to many families. In Valmiki's own words, she was not stone. She was a woman living alone in tapas, unseen by the world, waiting, and Rama came and honoured her.
**
Let us gather what we heard tonight.
Vishwamitra asked Dasharatha for Rama to protect his yajna, and Vasishtha helped the worried father say yes. On the banks of the Sarayu, Vishwamitra taught Rama and Lakshmana the Bala and Atibala mantras and told them the stories of the places they passed. At Gautama's ashram, Rama honoured Ahalya, who had lived unseen for years, and she was restored to her husband.
**One thing to take with you.** Rama's first act when he met Ahalya was to bow to her. He did not ask what had happened. He showed respect first. This week, if you meet someone whom others speak about, or keep away from, greet them with respect before you think anything else. Let respect come first.
In our next sitting we reach Mithila, where a king has a bow that no one can lift, and a daughter who was found in a furrow of the earth.
**
**Credits (read out):** Written by the DharmikStudio team from the Sanskrit text of the Valmiki Ramayana, Bala Kanda. Narrated with an AI voice. If you hear a mistake, please use "Report a mistake" on this episode.